On the cedar porch of Sunset Peak’s Timber Lodge, Austin reached down to the leather tool holster at his hip.
With a crisp flick of his thumb, he drew his stainless utility knife. The carbon-steel blade snapped open with a mechanical *shlock*.
Austin stepped up to the thirty-pound golden sphere resting in Li Xiaoyao’s trembling arms. The fruit was as big as a naval cannonball, glowing with warm orange luminescence and weeping microscopic beads of nectar that hissed softly against the deck boards.
Holding the fruit steady with a gloved thumb, Austin sliced cleanly:
*Shhhhhhk.*
A paper-thin crescent of amber flesh peeled away. Austin speared the slice on his knife tip and popped it into his mouth.
He chewed with slow, methodical contractor focus.
Through the dark green lenses of his Shade-14 arc-welding goggles, Austin’s eyes widened slightly in genuine surprise:
"Brix sugar rating has to be thirty-two percent minimum. Phenomenal sucrose density. Crisp cell wall turgor, zero mealy graininess, zero pit rot, clean flesh right to the stone. Skin thickness is uniform to two-tenths of a millimeter."
Austin wiped the blade against his denim dungarees:
"Textbook botanical optimization. That’s what happens when you introduce continuous, full-spectrum twenty-four-hour photosynthetic lighting with elevated ultraviolet-A wavelengths. You bypass the night respiration phase entirely. The Calvin cycle runs at maximum throughput, converting carbon dioxide and water into glucose at four times the standard rate. Basic horticultural physics."
Xiaoyao knelt on the cedar boards, his arms quivering under the thirty-pound load. Behind his emerald Shade-5 glasses, his eyes spun with religious fever:
"Grand Senior! You speak of physics, but this is a divine resurrection!"
Xiaoyao shifted his grip, voice shaking:
"Three hours ago, this was a stunted wild peach tree clinging to the eastern cliff! For sixty years, it grew only tiny, bitter nodules mountain goats refused to touch! But the second your new sun ignited, the trunk groaned like a waking dragon! Black bark split wide open, weeping golden sap! Thorns melted into jade leaves, and in two hours, forty-eight heavenly longevity peaches ripened on the boughs!"
The kid swallowed hard:
"Old Man Liu down at the supply depot had three months to live from stone-lung rot. He ate half a fallen peach! His white hair turned ink-black in twelve breaths! His withered lungs coughed out sixty years of quarry dust! He sprinted three miles without losing his breath! His lifespan jumped two full centuries!"
Austin snapped the utility knife shut and slipped it into its sheath:
"Of course his lungs cleared. Ultraviolet radiation at two hundred and eighty nanometers is a proven germicidal agent. Couple that with heavy antioxidants and clean glucose, and any compromised immune system gets a massive metabolic jumpstart. Preventative nutrition, Xiaoyao. Not magic."
Before Austin could explain cellular adenosine triphosphate synthesis, the summit freight lift slammed to a halt at the plaza apron:
*RATTLE-CLANG-THUD!*
Heavy, frantic boots pounded across the gravel.
Tie Kuang came charging up the porch steps three at a time. The dwarf clutched an armful of fluttering paper dispatches, his yellow hard hat cocked back on his brow, his green safety glasses shoved onto his forehead so he could rub his bewildered eyes:
"Master Austin! Urgent carrier-pigeon talismans and emergency dispatches from Governor Zhao and sixty provincial prefectures across the south!"
Austin leaned against the rail, his clipboard resting against his thigh:
"What broke, Tie Kuang? Did the highway wash out from premature snowmelt?"
"No, Master Austin! It’s an agricultural miracle of cosmic proportions!" Tie Kuang bellowed, his gear-shaped Golden Core whirring frantically behind his ribs. "The perpetual daylight radiating from your Second Sun washed over three million acres of southern farmland in a single afternoon!"
Tie Kuang shoved a dispatch forward, his thick thumb jabbing lines of ink-smeared calligraphy:
"The winter wheat across sixty prefectures—crops that weren't supposed to shoot stalks until next spring—matured, formed full heads, and ripened into a waist-high sea of golden grain in less than four hours!"
He flipped the page with shaking fingers:
"The black stem rust that ruined southern river valleys for sixty years has been wiped out clean! Orchards are collapsing under watermelons the size of siege boulders! In seven market cities, bedridden elders with rotten joints crawled out of bed, grabbed hoes, and sprinted into the wheat singing hymns to Sunset Peak!"
Austin took the dispatch, scanning the field reports with practiced speed through his welding goggles:
"Makes total sense. Fungal spores can't stand direct ultraviolet rays. Ten gigawatts of bright sunlight acts like a clean sterilization sweep, stopping rot before it takes hold. Constant daylight makes the grain shoot up fast. Solid farming."
Tie Kuang stared at him, blinking at the technical terms, then pointed a thick finger toward the valley floor:
"Master Austin... you need to see the mountain road."
Austin stepped to the outer rail and leaned over the handrail.
Through the dark green Shade-14 welding lenses, the southern valley unfolded below.
The main provincial highway winding up from the Canglan plains was completely jammed.
Stretching from the base of Mount Clear Sky to the horizon was an unbroken line of ten thousand freight wagons, ox-carts, and handbarrows heaped with golden wheat sheaves, cured hams, wine barrels, giant melons, and medicinal roots. Walking alongside were tens of thousands of farmers, village headmen, magistrates, and wandering cultivators.
No army was invading. Tens of thousands of common folk marched up the switchbacks carrying smoking bronze incense pots, singing harmonious pastoral chants, and hoisting brightly painted clay statues above their heads.
Austin squinted down at the nearest wagon rumbling past the lower terrace:
"What on earth are those clay statues they’re parading around?"
Old Patriarch Jiang Taixu stepped onto the porch, adjusting his green Shade-5 safety glasses with both hands. The old patriarch looked visibly overwhelmed:
"Master Austin... the mortal populace across four southern provinces has torn down the ancient ancestral shrines of the mountain gods."
"Why would they tear down municipal property?" Austin asked, glancing back.
"Because the mountain gods never ripened their wheat in an afternoon!" Jiang Taixu said, his voice dropping to a trembling whisper. "In place of the old stone idols, every village, hamlet, and crossroads market has built shrines to the **Lord of the High Noon**."
Jiang reached into his Daoist sleeve and set a six-inch clay figurine on the cedar table beside Austin’s teacup.
Austin picked up the clay idol, inspecting it under the solar glare.
It was a hand-sculpted effigy of a man with a square, stubborn jaw. On its head sat a midnight-blue round helmet with a narrow brim. Over its eyes were two round green lenses painted with crushed malachite. Draped over its torso was a bright orange tunic adorned with silver reflective leaf. Across its right shoulder, the effigy carried a meticulously sculpted, five-foot notched iron lever with a movable jaw.
Austin turned the figurine over in his calloused fingers, his brow knotting behind his welding goggles:
"Is... is this supposed to be me?"
"It is your divine avatar, Master Austin!" Jiang Taixu proclaimed, bowing low. "The mortal realm recognizes its master! They revere you as the Divine Architect of Creation, the Golden Sun Sovereign who brought endless bounty to the earth!"
Austin stared at the figurine’s waist, his mouth twisting in irritation:
"Why did they paint my toolbelt bright yellow?"
"P-Pardon, Master Austin?" Jiang Taixu blinked, thrown completely off stride.
"My toolbelt is oiled, six-ounce full-grain saddle leather," Austin said flatly, tapping the clay waistline with his grease pencil. "It’s dark brown. Yellow nylon tool belts are cheap starter kits sold to weekend DIYers. If you show up to a serious commercial job site wearing bright yellow nylon, the framing crew will laugh you off the scaffold before lunch."
Austin set the figurine down with an annoyed shake of his head:
"And the knurling on this pipe wrench handle is all wrong. It looks like a corncob. Apply sixty foot-pounds of torque with a grip like that and you'll peel the skin right off your palms."
"M-Master Austin..." Tie Kuang stammered. "There are forty thousand wagonloads of grain rolling toward our lower gate! The people are waiting for an imperial proclamation from the Lord of the High Noon! What are your orders?!"
Austin let out a tired sigh. He grabbed his wooden clipboard, clicked his grease pencil, and flipped to a fresh sheet:
"First, tell the logistics crew on Floor 1 to open the secondary dry storage silos. If forty thousand wagonloads of grain sit out in open humidity, we’ll have an infestation of flour beetles within forty-eight hours. Weigh every wagon on the platform scales, log moisture content, and issue receipt vouchers."
"Receipt vouchers for offerings of the faithful?!" Jiang Taixu gasped. "The gods take without counting!"
"I’m not a god, I’m a general contractor," Austin snapped. "And general contractors keep inventory logs. Second, issue an immediate agricultural memo to all sixty provincial prefectures."
Jiang Taixu pulled a fresh brush and inkstone from his robes, hands shaking:
"The Sovereign’s Divine Mandate! Speak, Grand Senior! What holy scriptures shall be inscribed upon the hearts of the mortals?!"
Austin adjusted his Sovereign Hard Hat and dictated in a level monotone:
"Memo: To all southern agricultural magistrates and farming committees. Subject: Soil nutrient management under accelerated photoperiods."
Jiang Taixu’s brush hovered: "S-Soil... nutrient management...?"
"Write it down," Austin ordered. "Paragraph one: Continuous solar irradiation forces long-day cereal crops to pull massive quantities of nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium from the topsoil."
Jiang’s brush frantically scratched across the parchment: *The Sovereign warns: The celestial fire drinks deep of the earth’s hidden blood...*
"Paragraph two," Austin continued. "If local farmers try to plant a second consecutive cycle of winter wheat without proper soil amendments, topsoil chemistry will be completely depleted by mid-spring. You will induce severe micronutrient deficiency, soil acidification, and permanent land degradation. In plain English: you’re going to turn the southern plains into a barren dust bowl."
Jiang Taixu was sweating profusely now: *Lest the greed of mortals summon the Great Dust Demon to devour the plains...*
"Paragraph three: The implementation of four-field crop rotation is mandatory. Following this harvest, fifty percent of all acreage must be sown with nitrogen-fixing cover crops—specifically clover, alfalfa, or field peas. Leguminous root nodules host symbiotic Rhizobium bacteria that pull atmospheric nitrogen and convert it into water-soluble nitrates, naturally replenishing the soil table without synthetic chemical fertilizers. Crop rotation isn't a suggestion. It is standard agricultural code."
Austin pointed his pencil straight at Jiang Taixu:
"Make sure that memo gets delivered to every village headman. If I see a single field depleted because some idiot refused to plant clover, I will personally inspect their farm and revoke their water rights."
Jiang Taixu blew on the wet ink with reverence, tears in his eyes:
"The Sovereign’s wisdom is boundless! The Holy Rite of the Three-Leaf Clover shall be carved upon every village gate! The earth shall be preserved beneath the eternal sun!"
Austin shook his head: "It’s not a holy rite. It’s middle-school biology."
He turned back toward his rocking chair, reaching out to pick up his cup of chicory tea.
The world stopped.
Without warning, the warm, honey-scented mountain air plummeted forty degrees in a split second.
*HISSSSSSSSSSSSS!*
The gentle breeze died, replaced by a biting, subzero gale that whipped through the porch railings. Frost flashed across the cedar decking, glazing the wooden boards in a brittle skin of white rime.
On the table, Austin’s tea mug rattled against its porcelain saucer:
*Clatter-clatter-clatter-clatter!*
A low, subterranean rumble rolled through the granite root of Mount Clear Sky—a vibration so deep that the four hundred pounds of lead in Austin’s pockets hummed with sympathetic resonance.
Down on the terraces, the singing of the fifty thousand cultivators choked off. Down in the valley, tens of thousands of farmers froze, dropping their incense pots as the heavy wagons shuddered on their axles.
High above in the heavens, the five-thousand-mile vortex of purple tribulation clouds suddenly locked up.
The colossal storm wall ground to a dead halt.
The swirling eye at the center contracted from fifty miles wide down to a single, hyper-dense, pitch-black puncture in the firmament.
The void locked its pitiless focus directly onto the roof of the Timber Lodge—aimed straight at Austin’s midnight-blue Sovereign Hard Hat.
Deep within that black tear in reality, the void split open.
Nine colossal, serpentine coils of blinding, electric-violet lightning tore through the spatial fabric of the stratosphere. Each coil was leagues long, thrashing with five hundred million volts of concentrated celestial fury, hissing like ancient vipers across the edge of space!
The Heavenly Dao had run out of patience.
The **Nine-Headed Ancient Violet Lightning Dragon** had awakened.